I Had Embarked My Heavy Baggage On Board A London Ship,
Which Happened To Be At Nice, Ready To Sail:
As for our small
trunks or portmanteaus, which we carried along with us, they were
examined at Antibes; but the ceremony was performed very
superficially, in consequence of tipping the searcher with half-a-crown,
which is a wonderful conciliator at all the bureaus in
this country.
We lay at Cannes, a neat village, charmingly situated on the
beach of the Mediterranean, exactly opposite to the isles
Marguerites, where state-prisoners are confined. As there are
some good houses in this place, I would rather live here for the
sake of the mild climate, than either at Antibes or Nice. Here
you are not cooped up within walls, nor crowded with soldiers and
people: but are already in the country, enjoy a fine air, and are
well supplied with all sorts of fish.
The mountains of Esterelles, which in one of my former letters I
described as a most romantic and noble plantation of ever-greens,
trees, shrubs, and aromatic plants, is at present quite desolate.
Last summer, some execrable villains set fire to the pines, when
the wind was high. It continued burning for several months, and
the conflagration extended above ten leagues, consuming an
incredible quantity of timber. The ground is now naked on each
side of the road, or occupied by the black trunks of the trees,
which have been scorched without falling. They stand as so many
monuments of the judgment of heaven, filling the mind with horror
and compassion.
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